Tuesday, May 14, 2013

Welcome to the Party

For 4 years now, conservatives have been trying to tell Americans that Obama isn't the Lightworker he was thought to be. A lapdog press shielded, and shilled, for him at every opportunity. They ignored as "partisan hackery" anything that might make him look bad. But when one of their oxes finally gets bored, only then do they open their eyes to reality. Here's the cover of the Boston Herald, not known for its conservative leanings:

You're a little late to the party, MSM, and for quite awhile you trashed the party all you could, but we'll be gracious hosts now that you've decided to attend anyway. The press isn't up in arms about Benghazi or the IRS, but at least they're starting to report those stories seriously. They sure are angry about the AP story, though:

The seizure of the phone records, disclosed earlier Monday by AP President and CEO Gary Pruitt, is the latest move in a series of high profile and controversial investigations of leaks of classified information by the Justice Department. In a letter of protest to Attorney General Eric Holder, Pruitt said obtaining more than two months of AP phone records on 20 separate telephone lines without prior notice was a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into news-gathering operations.

President Barack Obama seemed to lose control of his second-term agenda even before he was sworn in, when a school massacre led him to lift gun control to the fore. Now, as he tries to pivot from a stinging defeat on that issue and push forward on others, the president finds himself rocked by multiple controversies that are demoralizing his allies, emboldening his political foes and posing huge distractions for all...

So far, there's no evidence that Obama knew about - let alone was involved in - the government actions in question. But a president usually is held accountable for his administration's actions, and Republicans now have material to fuel accusations and congressional hearings that they hope will embarrass him, erode his credibility and bolster their argument that his government is overreaching. Even some of his Democratic allies are publicly expressing dismay at the AP phone records seizure.

If I enjoyed schadenfreude, I'd giggle at watching an organization I've referred to in the past as "al-AP" get its knickers in a bunch over actions of the Obama Administration--but I'm far too calm and mature for such things. I'm not going to turn them away when they're doing the right thing just because they were wrong in the past. Perhaps this experience will help those in the press remember the intent of press freedoms in the First Amendment--to serve as a watchdog, not a lapdog, over government.

The past few days have seen a cascade of evidence that the administration not only feigned transparency, but may have covered up the politicization of the IRS and the response to the terrorist attack on the Benghazi consulate. Whistle-blowers on the Benghazi response moved that story back into the headlines, but not for long. Because on Friday, the IRS admitted that it had targeted conservative groups for aggressive investigations. And that wasn't even the worst of the scandals.

Most pathetically, some of you are only turning on him now because
he’s been exposed going after the Associated Press. Going after the good
guys: you. Gasp! Hell hath no fury like a groupie scorned.
Well, what did you expect? You let the guy walk all over you for four
years, and then you flushed what’s left of your credibility down the
toilet to get him reelected, despite all his failures. You think he ever
respected you?

We told you this guy was a disaster waiting to happen. You didn’t
listen. He said the things you wanted to hear, he promised everybody
free candy for life, and you slobbered all over him like a bunch of
idiots. Now we’re going to laugh at you while you get all indignant at
him. While you pretend that only now has he gone too far.